Mozambique—Financial Sector Deepening (FSDMoç)

While Mozambique’s economy is emerging—notably through the extractives sector—most Mozambicans remain very poor. Financial Sector Deepening Mozambique (FSDMoç) was a facility to develop the country’s financial sector by expanding financial inclusion, which would help build local prosperity and economic resilience. FSDMoç aimed to create access to basic financial services for 2.6 million individuals and 1,000 businesses in Mozambique by 2019, targeting women, youth, and the rural poor as well as small and growing businesses that lacked access to appropriate and accessible financial services.

In July 2017, FSDMoç received an additional 39 million Swedish Krona (£3.5 million) from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency. These additional funds enabled FSDMoç to adapt to emerging opportunities in the digital finance, inclusive insurance, and housing finance sectors.

Sample Activities

• Provide technical expertise and targeted funding to help key stakeholders innovate and expand financial services.
• Develop financial infrastructure that broadens and deepens service offerings.
• Work with Mozambique’s government to create policies and regulations that support improvements to savings, credit, insurance, and payments.
• Foster public-private dialogue by creating and disseminating information, research, and data about inclusive finance.
• Enlist private sector partners to creatively address financial issues in the rural economy, particularly in agriculture.
• Partner with the Digital Frontiers Institute on meso-level activities such as payment systems, inter-operability, and development of technology solutions.
• Partner with the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor and others in applying Human-Centered Design to develop rural safety nets such as insurance and housing finance.

Select Results

• Partnered to implement saving groups models with the Aga Khan Foundation and CARE, creating 66 saving groups totaling more than 1,700 members, including move than 900 women.
• Enabled more than 130,000 financially underserved people (two-thirds women) to access and utilize at least one new financial service such as saving, borrowing, and e-payments—nearly 87,000 used more than one new service.
• Recorded 232 small and growing businesses newly receiving financial services or products.
• Launched the Fintech Innovation Fund, which selected seven grantees for funding and technical support to refine their proposals in financial technology.
• Built capacity within the Ministry of Economy and Finance, Central Bank, and Ministry of Industry and Commerce to make policy—notably on issues of private equity and investment that support financial inclusion.